George Jackson Puts Fiddle and Banjo Pairing Through Its Paces on ‘Hair & Hide’

The fiddle and the banjo represent the most American of musical pairings, combining to form a uniquely American sound that’s been at the heart of old-time stringband music and, more widely, country music. The fiddle and banjo reflect the cultures that formed the country, becoming a sonic representation of a melting pot.

It is with this history in mind that George Jackson, a New Zealand fiddler who now lives in Nashville, recorded his new album, Hair & Hide, exploring the raw materials of what makes bluegrass and old-time music. He assembled seven banjoists from the bluegrass community — Wes Corbett, Brad Kolodner, Jake Blount, Frank Evans, BB Bowness, Uma Peters, and Joe Overton — to play two songs each alongside him, inviting them to explore the relationship between a fiddle and a banjo.

Traditionally, fiddle and banjo duets most often result in dancing; and while there’s plenty of cause for dancing on Hair & Hide, much of this music explores themes far deeper than a quick-step. Throughout, the interplay of fiddle and banjo tells a whole story from start to finish, and as with all instrumental music, it’s the listener’s role to imagine the story being told.

With Bowness, one of Jackson’s childhood friends, he explores the adventure of traveling on “Prosser,” his fiddle nearly catching fire at the end as he leans hard into the melody’s twists. They also find a cheeky way to explore the world together on “Bits of Banjo,” quite literally combining bits of banjo sounds and matching them to the fiddle melody. (At the time of recording, Bowness was building a banjo by combining bits and pieces of different instruments.)

Jackson writes songs with an ear for narrative just as much as for melody. A sprightly and happy fiddle jitterbugs over a bouncing banjo on “Neighbor Mike,” a song created to honor a neighbor named Mike who embodies hospitality and harmony. Kolodner’s playing acts as a perfect foil, not least because Kolodner himself is among the most neighborly of musicians in his home city of Baltimore, where he has championed a strong old-time community. On “Lockdown” with Joe Overton, a twisty, half-confusing melody mirrors the bewilderment that beset the world as it shut down in March 2020.

Immediately following “Lockdown,” Jackson explores with Corbett what he must consider to be the three most important parts of life: “Food, Coffee, & Kisses.” The song resonates with an honest kind of humorous love, winking at his wife (the gifted songwriter and musician Rachel Baiman) as well as allowing Corbett to unleash the kind of teasing banjo solo that begs the devil to dance.

With Hair & Hide, Jackson and his accompanying banjoists pay homage to the history of old-time and bluegrass music while also proving the timelessness of fiddle and banjo duets.